Book Review: Wintergirls

Title: Wintergirls
Author: Laurie Halse Anderson
Published: Viking Juvenile, 2009
Rating: 5/5

Unable to live and unable to die Lia is frozen. With the death of her former childhood friend Lia's already self-destructive actions and mental state plummets into freezing conditions. Anderson's vivid and poetic writing will make her readers feel the crippling disgust Lia feels every time she eats, every time she counts a calorie and every time she cuts. Unable to see how much her actions are hurting her perplexed family, Lia drags them down until she touches the bottom of her icy cage. Anderson's complex characters and beautifully disturbing realism will bring her readers to the tragic reality of Lia's mind.

Book Review: Water for Elephants

Title: Water for Elephants
Author: Sara Gruen
Published: 2006, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
Rating: 5/5

During the Great Depression, a young man who seems to have lost everything all of sudden has a reason to live when he falls in love with a married circus performer. Jacob Jankowski and Marlena soon finds themselves threatened with the darker side of show business from her husband and his henchmen. Researched to the hilt, Gruen pulls her readers into the world of the old-time circus where men worked for little and animals hoped for kindness. Gruen builds the tension with each page and readers will not be disappointed with the explosive climax.